


A place to glue what’s busted.

by LittleSweetCheeks



Series: The Hearth Series [3]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Childhood, Gen, Repair, Strength, family day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 03:38:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13332693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleSweetCheeks/pseuds/LittleSweetCheeks
Summary: "But just because something has a few chips or cracks or scars, it doesn’t make them less good. We put it all back together and when it’s dry, those parts will be stronger now for having been broken."





	A place to glue what’s busted.

** A place to glue what’s busted. **

Dave had been sitting at his desk at home working on his next manuscript when a loud crash echoed through the house. Thirty seconds later, his new hunting dog, Dempsey, slunk into the room and hid under the desk. Dave’s brows rose. “What happened, Demps?”

A moment later, two little boys nervously appeared in the doorway.

“What was that crash?” Dave looked from his dog to his young charges.

Finally, Jack stepped forward, shoulders back and chin up. “We were tossing Dempsey’s ball and he slid too far and crashed into a shelf. There’s a bowl thing, it fell down and broke into a bunch of pieces.”

“I’m sorry.” Henry softly added from behind his friend.

Dave drew in a deep breath and let it out, shooting his dog a look. No wonder the mutt was looking guilty, technically he was the one who crashed. Standing, he ushered the boys out. “Show me.” He let them, slowly, lead him to the scene of the crime. The victim was a porcelain bowl that he’d been given as a gift along the way. It wasn’t valuable at all, that he was aware of, nor was it particularly sentimental, but it had been something Dave had liked because the pretty paintings on it, when one took the time to look closer, were actually naked men and women. Collecting all the big pieces, he ushered the boys into the kitchen and arranged everything on the counter before returning and sweeping up the small bits. Back in the kitchen, he looked up when Henry spoke again.

“Are you gonna tell my mom?”

He had to think on that a minute. He’d showed the boys what toys were okay to play with, it was unreasonable to expect them to anticipate the dog crashing into the shelves. JJ, and Aaron for that matter, would be upset something had been broken, but it wasn’t worth the fuss they would make. “That depends. Will you help me fix it?”

“It can be fixed?” Jack asked.

“We can give it a try.” Not a stranger to repairing broken things, Dave set them all to work collecting wax and other things needed until a bowl, with most of its parts, sat to dry and harden on the counter. “All done. Now we wait.”

“But it doesn’t look like it did before.” Jack pointed out.

“True. But just because something has a few chips or cracks or scars, it doesn’t make them less good. We put it all back together and when it’s dry, those parts will be stronger now for having been broken. And when I look at it on the shelf and see the cracks, I’ll remember having you both over here and teaching you how to fix things.” He smiled down at them both. “The broken bits will be a good memory.”

Jack chewed his lip in thought. “Thanks Uncle Dave.” He leaned sideways and gave the man a hug.

“Anytime, Kiddo. Anytime.”


End file.
